were the only towns in the United States of over 8000
inhabitants; all together they numbered scarcely 130,000. Their
populations were homogeneous; their wants were few; and they were
still in that happy childhood when every voter knew nearly every
other voter and when everybody knew his neighbor's business as
well as his own, and perhaps better.

Gradually the towns awoke to their newer needs and demanded
public service--lighting, street cleaning, fire protection,
public education. All these matters, however, could be easily
looked after by the mayor and the council committees. But when
these towns began to spread rapidly into cities, they quickly
outgrew their colonial garments. Yet the legislatures were loath
to cast the old garments aside. One may say that from 1840 to
1901, when the Galveston plan of commission government was
inaugurated, American municipal government was nothing but a
series of contests between a small body of alert citizens
attempting to fix responsibility on public officers and a few
adroit politicians attempting to elude responsibility; both sides
appealing to an electorate which was habitually somnolent but
subject to intermittent awakenings through spasms of
righteousness.

During this epoch no important city remained immune from ruthless
legislative interference. Year after year the legislature shifted
officers and responsibilities at the behest of the boss. "Ripper
bills" were passed, tearing up the entire administrative systems
of important municipalities. The city was made the plaything of
the boss and the machine.